I’ve got a confession to make. It’s my fault we’ve had a rubbish start to the season.
I should know better. It’s like waking up with a hangover on a work day. You promise yourself you’ll never do it again. Nothing ever good comes of it. But ultimately you know it’s your mouth writing cheques your drinking arm can’t cash.
In this particular case it is having a bet on us pre-season.
You know what it’s like. The long summer starved of any decent football, the app of your bookmaker just a thumb tap away.
We go and make 4 decent signings and hope swells within you.
This could be our year.
Best squad for ages.
Proven quality must pay dividends.
Etc. etc.
Any previous woes are a long, distant memory.
I thought I’d warned myself off of pre-season bets as invariably the opposite will happen to whatever is wagered upon.
I’m still living down last summers terrific bet of us finishing second in the league behind Man Utd. How was I to know our hero star player was to perform the most astonishing role reversal in to despised villain and derail the season?
And the year before that? Well I guaranteed Andy Carroll being injured for most of it by placing money on him being top scorer in the league.
These aren’t bets placed on fact, form or probability. They are the product of too much time spent in the garden, possibly alcohol, and most certainly this claret and blue blood coursing through our veins.
So I had successfully not looked at any odds on anything to do with us until about 2 weeks before the start of the season. But there was that buzz starting. The new signings, the talent we already had. The claret and blue was rushing to my brain and I was becoming weak.
Just one look. Can’t do any harm? Just going to look, yes sir, definitely not putting any money on. Nope. I’ve learnt my lesson.
So as my thumb scrolled through the minefield of weird and wonderful wagers available, one stuck out. The team to be top of the table on September 1st.
Hmmmm, I wonder what we are? Another quick scroll and I swear the phone started to flash and whir and light up like a well worn fruit machine down the front at Southend.
100/1 !!!!
Now as even as the most ardent non-betting person knows, if something is 100/1 you may as well just go and set light to your money. Either way you aren’t seeing it again.
But instead of moving along, something itched in my foggy brain. A quick re-check of the fixtures for August and the itch became the sound of bongo drums.
3 games, all away, 2 more than winnable and one punt.
Now with this fine looking squad it isn’t implausible we could nick something at Old Trafford, then go and get maximum points at Saints and Newcastle who both are definitely not as good as us. And with all games being away there isn’t the worry of the stadium of doom making us play like we hadn’t met before.
See? Now I say it like that it doesn’t sound that stupid. Does it?
It probably won’t happen, but it could. Wallop. On goes a fiver and I sit back deciding how I’ll spend my 500 quid at the start of September.
I should have just burnt the flipping fiver.
The law of sod (as always) took over and we ended up not top, oh no. Rock bloody bottom with our pants pulled down round our ankles.
I’m sorry. I promise I won’t do it again. I’ve learnt my lesson now.
In fact next summer I might just have the same bet but put it on Tottenham and see if the curse works on them too.
COYI